Biogenesis
by Kitahara
Summary: A group of scientists try to capture an alien to use it as a bait for...A WIP, my first fanfic, reviewscritique much appreciated.
1. Default Chapter

BIOGENESIS

1  
:: Beacon ::

The engines hummed in quiet monotone. The ship was sunk into deliberate darkness save for the indicator lights on the control panel in the cockpit, and even those had been dimmed. The cold hibernation of cryosleep was economical in everything that involved energy, and once the craft had been propelled to proper speed, it was left to its endless drift until the original impulse would fade to a complete stasis.

But 'endless' was the word from the human vocabulary, limited by the human capacities. The destination, albeit out of the time/space boundaries of the man's perception, was already near. In the depths of space where seconds didn't exist, indicators kept blinking until, with a soft click, the timing was right.

The craft was shaken into wakefulness by a single impulse wave. The clicking of locks and the hissing of pumps being activated signaled the journey was over. The craft's crew woke up from their cryo-encapsulated sleep near gamma Cephei, commonly known as Errai, and by the time the craft entered Planetary Nebula 6 everybody were already on their feet.

"Behold," said the Captain, "the Garnet Star."

And they did. Its bright red orb shone vivaciously - a ball-shaped wound on the sky's velvet.

"A pretty sight, but we must be out of here by the time Delta blinks again." The Navigator sifted through various marks and indices on the panel, pragmatics of his trade overriding any poetic metaphors the magnificence of Cepheus could inspire. "We've got five days all in all. Five days and nine hours, by the craft's clock, before this giant swells again."

The Captain nodded. He often wondered if there was anything behind those professional titles, but as a senior officer he knew better than ask for names. Not on a mission like theirs. Not in a place like Planetary Nebula 6, a small cluster of irregular stones that fried in seething heat and froze in deep winter according to the cruel variability of the huge double star. He hoped Errai and its red dwarf companion would be more placid, if not hospitable.

"Follow the beacon."

Programmed to search, the craft spiraled towards the center of the nebula, each loop of its route grew tighter around one particular formation that had been locked as a target by the coordinate grid. The globe was a rough ellipsoid, environmentally poor and overall unfriendly. The fact that its mass entitled it to a label 'planet' could hardly be a redeeming factor.

"This baby's got a long way to grow," remarked the Navigator as he laid the course for the landing. Then, with a skeptical look at the smudge on the screen that was the planet's surface, he added: "Get ready. The touch-down will be rough."

That didn't come as a surprise for the seven members of the research spacecraft's crew. Looking at the five people, belted to the seats with hands clasping armrests till the knuckles turned white, the Captain wondered once more if they were clones. Named Engineer One to Five, they looked perfectly alike in their faceless, unified equipment. Chances were high all of them had indeed been cloned off some smart-arse scientist back on Earth after he - or she? - hit on some witty formula regarding ageing, or fat reduction, or whatever those geneticists made their money on.

"We're entering on the nightside. By Jove, it's a real frontier."

Two men and three women didn't show their emotions, if there were any, by even a flinch. The wrinkled, viscous surface of the massing clouds rushed past the descending craft as it slowed down and finally settled into a hovering mode. Reliable equipment and even all prospects of big money aside, the Captain wasn't going to dive into the new world unprepared.

"Where exactly was the signal last located?"

"25 degrees to the north," one of the clones replied. Engineer 3, the Captain marked to himself. The lucky terrestrial jackass Number Three.

"How many should we pick up?"

"One. Just one." The Engineer's reply was curt, as if he had read the Captain's thoughts. "All others should be eliminated."

"Wouldn't it be more rational to launch the project right here? The transportation of such...objects," the Captain made a sour grimace at the word, "is a risk that is hardly justifiable."

"Maintaining control over a colony this far from the base is still more risky. And they aren't just 'objects' - they are xenomorphs." The Engineer leaned forth towards the Captain. "Mind that, Sir."

The craft touched the surface in a series of severe bumps and finally came to a standstill. Moving as if they were one body, all five Engineers set the timing on their watches.

"You've got nothing to worry about, Captain. They will be in embryo form while it's cold. We have five days and nine hours to find their ship, get one of them, transport it to our craft, and leave. Pretty much enough time for everything."

"So it should be," muttered the Captain with more of politeness than certainty. Experience had taught him that in space the Subjunctive never really worked.

"It was a good planet. In a way, it had potential."

The Navigator observed the white halo of the explosion with vague sadness.

"Whatever potential it had, it is now on our ship." One of the clones entered the cockpit - the first appearance of somebody from the research crew after several hours spent in total seclusion in their lab. "I am to report that the embryo is secure. For the safety of the ship and its crew, it will remain sealed till we reach the base."

What a relief, the Captain smirked mentally. Especially if the 'seal' was made of something like molten lead.

"Whatever your measures, I'm still deeply worried by its presence onboard," he noticed coldly, and the clone's brows rose in surprise. Number Four, a female variant of the prototype, was always perhaps the most expressive of them all. "We've heard enough of stories about the attempts to get a sample of this species. All of those were unsuccessful attempts."

"True," the clone nodded with endless patience on her genetically constructed face. "All those times the failure was in the belief that this species can be controlled and studied. This belief is, of course, false."

"I can't say how happy I am to know that you realize that." The skepticism in the Navigator's voice couldn't have been more poorly masked.

"Meanwhile," the clone continued with the same serenity as if no words had interrupted her, "our intention is exactly the opposite." She made a pause that almost seemed dramatic. "We will just let it develop on its own. Minimal interference. Minimal human contact."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but won't a human be required to..." the Navigator searched for the right word to describe the repulsive process. "To hatch the egg?"

"Not any more. The embryo will be placed into one of the clones." Finally her patience cracked and she looked at the two officers as if they were schoolboys who hadn't learnt their lesson. "Clones aren't considered human by the terrestrial laws."

They were just numbered bodies, the Captain reminded himself. The wrinkles could be multiplied, and the freckles, and the hair colour - but the original personality was always above serial numbers.

"Would you like to see how we cater for our project?"

Both officers followed the clone's inviting gesture. The lab occupied the best part of the craft's space, and now, thanks to the clones' activities, it had been transformed into a high-tech prison cell. The centre of the lab was a huge transparent cube, inside which the egg-shaped object resided.

"We maintain near-vacuum conditions inside. Lowest temperatures, no air, no chemical catalysts, no sound. Total isolation." Number One looked up from the control panel to furnish explanations. The Captain admitted that this research crew followed a policy indeed radically different from all previous attempts: a most democratic frankness in all details. "And thus, there is virtually no stimulus to wake it from its sleep."

The officers took a tentative step forwards, and the Navigator, the one with a weaker stomach, immediately drew back. The Captain watched on, mesmerized by the sight.

The 'egg', or whatever it was called by the xenobiologists, sat freely upon a platform. It took the Captain a moment of closer observation to see that its freedom was only illusion. The transparent cube was filled with an interweaving lace of thin metal threads that stretched from its walls towards the xenomorph embryo. The petals of its mouth had indeed been sealed - stitched together by the threads that would only hold tighter, should the alien inside try to steer.

The Captain stepped back. Maybe the clones had hoped this view would calm him down, but right now he was more appalled and anything but calm.

Number Four looked at him with a smile.

"See? We're not going to cut it open or disturb in any other way until we arrive to the base."

"I'll hope that you'll resist the temptation," the Captain shrugged doubtfully.

"Oh yes, we will. As I have said, our expedition is different from the others - because the xenomorph isn't really our aim. In our scenario, it is no more than a bait."

The clones were politely expecting further questions, but the Captain thought that he'd be damned if he asked what kind of fish they planned to catch with a bait like this. 


	2. Kerberos

2  
:: Kerberos ::

"In all encounters with the xenomorphs the human side always believed those creatures were only mindless enemies bent on killing everything that moved. We thought that they were driven only by instinct. Insects, parasites, from the man's point of view." Engineer Number One, the eldest male of the five clones, spoke almost dream-like. "We never really asked ourselves how those insects managed to move in space. But they have built spaceships faster, bigger and better than we build. Their nature has played a wicked trick on them because they can only reproduce through an intermediary carrier, and they had to solve this problem. They searched for suitable races, no easy task in the vastness of the space. They piloted their way to those planets and made careful ambushes for the fitting species. All this requires technical skill that is way too high for just an ant."

The Captain listened to the clone with a cup of coffee in his hands. Holding the hot mug kept him from undignified fidgeting.

"Their journeys had to become longer with time, and eventually they had to meet a race that didn't give up without a fight. We can't know how much of a fight that was, and how successful, but what we do know is, that the other race won. At least once."

"Somehow I don't believe you're speaking about us humans."

The clone shrugged indifferently. "Well, the race is humanoid, at least. They call themselves yautja. We've come to the conclusion that the high level of their technical development was stimulated by the clash with xenomorphs, in the first place." The clone's lips curved into a smile. "Another name they like is 'hunters', mostly because they've made it their sport to hunt the xenomorphs."

"You know quite a lot about them, no?" Somehow the mention of either race made the Captain equally uneasy.

"They used to visit Earth occasionally. Until 2004, when the last of their hunting grounds was demolished thanks to the careless, ill-prepared and egotistical pursuits of the Weyland Corporation. Since then they can't be possibly motivated to come to us again."

The Captain stared into his mug. The black liquid inside it was now transparent, just like the clones' mission was.

"You don't seem to like Weyland guys, do you?"

"And now it is time to remind you, Captain, that you and your craft work for Mr. Lorentz. In the past decade, the Lorentz Research Holding has won thirty percent of shares over Weyland."

"The bloke is just too damn fortunate," the Captain shrugged. The news that somebody was more successful than him made him feel slightly uncomfortable. "Can't say I feel moved to sympathize with him, though. I haven't even seen him."

"Look at me, then. Mr. Lorentz is our prototype."

The Borderland Station 57 was better known among its populace as 'Kerberos'. It was located on one of the asteroids between Mars and Jupiter. Its reddish, airless surface swelled on the craft's screen until it occupied it all, and finally the Navigator announced the successful landing.

"Please remain in the cockpit while we'll be transferring our cargo," Engineer One advised in a tone that clearly marked it as a command. "The seal holds, but we don't want to run into any more risk."

Neither of the officers felt like disobeying anyway. They watched how the loaders bustled in the dock. When all gates except one were hermetically locked, the container cube was lowered onto the loader's platform and slowly driven away. The Captain followed it with his eyes until the loader disappeared behind the entrance gate into the main lab premises.

The gates then closed leaving only one man in the dock.

"Well, I'll be damned," said the Navigator. "He looks like the sixth brother of our engineer friends."

"The prototype," the Captain muttered under his nose.

The tall, fair-haired man stood right in front of the cockpit's screen. He seemed to feel the people inside were watching him, and he waved to them with a most carefree air.

"Gentlemen, welcome to Kerberos." He raised his arm in warm welcome. "The property of Lorentz Research Holding. My property, in plain words."

After a short while, sitting in the private office of the Holding's owner, the Captain admired the spotless surfaces and wondered if Lorentz's land looked any special comparing with his rival, Weyland. The same high-tech style everywhere was pretty much faceless. If this corporation was in any way different from the other, the difference had to lie in the mind of its leader. And even there, the Captain was sure, the same lines ran. Two industrial billionaires, arrogant buffoons drowning in luxury, ready to put anything at stake in the hope to gain still more. Just two evils to choose from for a poor guy like himself.

"I suppose my assistants have informed you about our mission?"

"In detail." The Captain wasn't sure he wanted to know anything more. "Whatever you want to use this egg for, it's none of my business once it's off my ship."

"Don't tell me you're not curious. For a captain of a ship on deep space routes, you must be wary about what you may encounter there. The deeper you get, the bigger the chances you'll meet one of the two races my Holding studies. Or both."

With a click of the remote control, Lorentz started the hologram.

"You know the xenomorph already. From the embryo - we call it the egg - it evolves into young brood inside a warm-blooded carrier. The adult forms are mostly drones who serve a queen - just like the bees back on Earth, and so the system was promptly called a 'hive'. That's what everybody knows. The unknown fact is that xenomorphs have a culture of their own. They build cities that look like torn out intestines. They have a language and they can write. They feel, think, and probably have an aim in life - which we'd rather not know."

Thank God at least for that, the Captain thought. It was nice to hear that the scientists' interest had reasonable limits.

"And now imagine a race like this has been made quarry in the game another race plays. Bred like cattle, destined to die not even knowing who they are and how they got there. Generations of prisoners, forever subjugated to the species they once planned to conquer."

"Yautja," the Captain blurted out and hurried to add when Lorentz furrowed his brows at him, "One of the clones told me."

"Then it's time to show you the picture." The hologram changed with a ripple of light and showed a 3-D model of a humanoid form much bigger than the average man. Beside its generally impressive muscular frame little could be seen under the armour and weaponry that covered most of its body.

"Xenomorphs are promptly called 'aliens' - they are too distant from us, our physique, our mind. But this species looks a lot more like me and you. Ah, there's so much we could borrow from them..."

"Doesn't look like this guy and his kin would be willing to answer your questions."

"But I have all means of persuasion," Lorentz's voice was silky and certain.

Not that the Captain had any doubts about that. He shifted uneasily under Lorentz's confident stare.

"Anyway, how do you plan to lure them here?"

"To lure...what a nice word." Lorentz switched off the hologram, stretched his arms and then leaned against the table. "What's your name, Captain?"

"Gregor."

"Oh, fine, Greg. I'll keep the technical details simple for you. When Weyland razed the last hunting pyramid on Earth, we salvaged something that he missed. I mean the scans of the structure that were passed on to the satellite - not recommended to do if you mean to keep your data safe. Then we analyzed what he saw without even realizing what it was, and some things we were able to reconstruct, first of all, the beacon that signals the presence of xenomorphs. That, and the fact that those hunters are as gambling as a hardcore football fan, should be enough to get them interested."

The Captain felt some response from him was expected, but all this was really beyond him. He had a suspicion he and his craft had landed in a game where the players were a deal more skilful than him, and the stakes were high enough to turn him bankrupt any moment. He wanted to be out of it all, the sooner the better.

"Come on, Greg, let's go see how the egg is opened. Not many have seen that and survived." With a contented chuckle, Lorentz moved to the door. The Captain watched his back, wide and strong under white immaculate suit.

"My name is Gregor. Not Greg." 


	3. Birth

3  
:: Birth :: 

A/N: I forgot to mention that this is in fact a songfic. Based on 'Biogenesis' by a Japanese goth band, Schwarz Stein. The text is in the end of this chapter. With that, enjoy!

The opening of the seal was scheduled at midday, local time, when the red disk of Mars was like a big full dish on the lab's screens. The corridors of Kerberos were empty, but as the Captain walked towards the command station he felt that if only he turned fast enough he'd catch a glimpse of a busy shadow running past.

The cube with the egg was stationed behind several protective walls, all conveniently transparent. The opening had begun several hours ago by raising the temperature and adding air to the vacuum around the cube. Now constant currents of warm air caressed the egg's wrinkled surface and created an illusion of movement.

"That should wake it from its sleep," said one of the clones the moment Lorentz and the Captain entered the lab.

"We've built a nice home for it. It should feel welcomed."

At Lorentz's words, the Captain looked around. The white, plain corridors ended at the lab's door; inside, it was a plexus of tubes and ducts. Some were of glistening metal, some - semi-transparent, stretchable like plastic, membranes and hoses, coiling against dark walls covered with microchips and circuits. The controls at the walls seemed to need more than five human fingers to manipulate. The room made a dizzying effect, and the Captain tried not to look too closely at the details for any long time.

"The scissors, please."

Two curved blades, attached to metallic mock-hand manipulators, reached to the egg and cut off the threads holding it in place.

"Forceps." Lorentz directed the operation like an experienced surgeon.

The forceps grabbed the staples that were embedded in the egg's tissue to hold the threads. At first, nothing happened, but as the hands pulled harder the bars of wire began to stir pulling the flesh after them. It stretched bit by bit, becoming thinner, until the staples were torn out, leaving small rivulets of green opalescent fluid to ooze from the holes. And finally, with a fruity plop, the petals burst open and revealed tender pink insides.

"Number Four, please enter."

I don't want to look, thought the Captain. "I don't want to look," he said it aloud.

"But Greg, it's the most interesting part," chided Lorentz, not really looking at him.

Use your chance and leave, advised the Captain to himself. But his movements were slow despite his will and from the corner of his eye he saw the human figure - Number Four, the most animated of all five clones - enter the cube compartment. A second later, before he turned away completely, he noticed a small shadow dart across the screen, a round blot with a black line for the tail and a moving nimbus of clawed limbs.

He walked through the silent, empty corridors. With every turn he was quickening his step, and the final distance to his craft he crossed in a fast sprint.

"We must get out of here. Now."

"But," his Navigator was sitting by the escape hatch, smoking. "What about permission and all? We work for this guy, after all. We can't just...leave, can we?"

They wouldn't let them leave anyway. The Captain realized that in a flash. Every gate of the station, every passage must have been sealed by now, to ensure complete closure and autonomy.

"Lock the hatches at least."

The doors hissed and clicked as they closed, but that brought little relief to the Captain's mind. Even sitting in the now self-sufficient craft he felt nervous and kept staring at the wide gap of the corridor to the lab. The Navigator sat beside him looking in the same direction.

"What the hell's happened to the clocks?"

The indicator panel by the corridor gate that used to display the current environmental parameters of the station now was showing something nonsensical. The quickly decreasing figures still indicated time, but time going backwards.

"Shit," answered the Captain. "Shit, shit, shit."

That was how much they had left. Slightly less than six hours - not very generous. The six hours required for the maturation of the embryo inside a human carrier. How big would it grow by then? How quick would it move? And most important, in what direction?

"Get the engines ready," the Captain commanded, his eyes still on the clock. "Just in case."

He chose the copy number four of himself only for practical reasons. It was known that a lot depended on the physique of the carrier: stronger, more agile individuals made the incubation period shorter while in the weaker, calmer ones the embryo languished. As to her being a female...Lorentz smirked inwardly thinking that Dr. Freud would have a word or two to say on the matter. Did he want it to be a cold experiment or a dramatic birth involving a real mother? Was the thought of a man being impregnated by this violent parasite, intruded by its seminal tubule, really that atrocious beyond all logic? They were his clones, but he felt more bound to the male ones: they looked too much like himself.

He looked at the facehugger that was making itself comfortable on the Four, and his mouth turned dry. From his viewpoint, he could see its long thin claws envelop the human head, slowly, almost tenderly moving around to get a better, tighter position. The creature's seminal organ wasn't visible, but he could see how the soft flesh on its back pulsed rhythmically expelling the embryo. At some point the human almost choked on the large lump of tissue that was being forced into her, and the facehugger's tail coiled around her throat, massaging it gently until the embryo slid through.

This caring movement was the last the creature had strength to produce - together with the embryo, life left it, and it fell off the human's face, landing on the floor with a dull thud. Lorentz stared at the scene until one of the remaining clones coughed in a politely encouraging way.

"What? Oh right, start the countdown."

Despite the effort to keep calm, Lorentz seemed distracted. His eyes were still on the two figures behind the glass, one dead and the other nearly so. She never showed a slightest wish to disagree. That was expected, of course, from a clone. In a way, she was like those hand manipulators - one of his instruments, a bit more precise than any other. She was fit to be used in the most complex tasks.

She used to be part of his DNA and his genius. She used to.

He licked his lips that felt dry as paper and then covered his mouth with his palm in a gesture of instinctive protection.

Schwarz Stein: BIO GENESIS Yes, the urge to procreate The beat pushing us on towards chaos Into this increasingly empty world was he born Uncertainty Cold mechanality Birthed from an inhuman mother The symbol of rebirth's light The one to become God supreme Now Creation Standing into eternity Self Supreme Rise Blaze bleed Awake An alarm bell in this increasingly impure world Cells evolved to perfection Yes Now Thoughts produced to excel all Start up Birthed from a grotesque mother True paradise Eternal The lord who rules over the world Will stand into eternity Self Ascension of the lord Rise Blaze Bleed Awake Yes, the urge to procreate The beat pushing us on towards chaos Into this increasingly empty world was I born Uncertainty Cold mechanality Birthed from an inhuman mother The symbol of rebirth's light The one to become God supreme Now Creation Standing into eternity Self Supreme Rise Blaze Bleed Awake


End file.
